


You Have To Wonder

by jell_0_shot



Category: Wine Country (2019)
Genre: Canon Compliant, F/F, like watch this movie and look me in the eyes and say they weren't falling in love, well in my head it's just canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-14
Updated: 2020-11-14
Packaged: 2021-03-10 00:48:05
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,723
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27555604
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jell_0_shot/pseuds/jell_0_shot
Summary: Catherine Stewart of Cutie Pies said, "Did you guys even notice that I was gone?" and I said yes! I did! I did notice! And I also noticed that the last time we saw you, you were drinking beer in a pub with Tammy. And my mind made the logical and natural jump.or: whether intentional or not, the way Tina Fey and Ana Gasteyer played their characters in Wine Country (2019) ended up being very, very gay, and I had to write about it.
Relationships: Catherine/Tammy
Comments: 1
Kudos: 10





	You Have To Wonder

**Author's Note:**

> If my legacy in this life is to be the first and (currently) only person to post Wine Country (2019) fanfiction on the internet, then so be it. This is for Joy, because it's her birthday and I love her and also because Catherine of Cutie Pies belongs to us & our never-ending adamant belief in her love affair with Tammy.

Catherine’s trying really, really hard to not hate Napa. 

It’s not that it isn’t beautiful, and wonderful, and full of wine and lovely people and incredible views. It is. There’s just no signal _anywhere_ , and it’s driving her insane. 

Although, right now she’s not exactly complaining. The lack of signal had given her a reason to sneak out of the art show and all of the weird lingering tension between everyone, and actually, the fresh air feels good. Nice. Needed. She takes a few extra breaths and steels herself – when she looks at her phone, there _will_ be service, god dammit. She’s putting it out into the world like The Secret. 

And then she looks at her phone. 

“Shit. Shit,” and that’s been her mantra for this whole trip, really. And she knows the others are getting annoyed – she can _feel_ it, especially from Naomi, but it’s not her fault that she has to work. 

It feels sort of hopeless and redundant, but she lifts her head and looks around as if her surroundings could possibly provide her with a solution. And then, shockingly, they do: there’s a faded and dull bar across the road, and although it looks dark and grim, she might be able to at least connect to the internet. She turns around, back to the building she just walked out of where all of her friends still are, and chews her lip. For a brief moment, she considers ignoring her phone and the cut-off call with Adrien so that she can join back up with them again. But then she remembers Abby’s strict itinerary, and the throwing out of the itineraries, and she loves her, she really does, but the thought of some respite from her current exhausting energy is more than tempting. 

She makes her mind up and crosses the street. _I wonder if they’ll even notice that I’m gone,_ she thinks, and then she shakes her head. She knows logically that that sort of rhetoric is born from her anxieties and insecurities and is rooted in nothing substantial, nothing real. It's just that sometimes, it really feels like it’s real. 

At first, she’s sure she’s come in the wrong entrance because it’s just a long, dusty hallway but she’s follows the light hum of music and it opens out into the bar. She makes a beeline for the bartender to ask about the Wi-Fi, and then oh – Tammy is here. 

She had taken an immediate liking to Tammy when they’d met yesterday, but that could have something to do with the praise she’d given Cutie Pies. Catherine knows she has an unhealthy tendency to crave validation about her business, even though it’s doing so well. It just means so much to her – it’s basically her whole world – so whenever someone compliments it, she’s like putty in their hands. 

And then Tammy is saying, “Here, give me your phone. I’ll get you online,” and there’s nothing staggeringly special or caring about the words, but Catherine gets stuck on her tone and the gesture: it’s nice. It’s really nice. Now that she’s actively considering it – her turning up at the house with a hangover smoothie and edible soap was really nice, too. She hadn’t thought too much of it at the time. She had been so preoccupied with work and the soap genuinely tasting of _only_ soap, but that seemed like more than her job description entailed. 

Surely her job description was to just hand over the house keys. 

So, Catherine passes over her phone and decides that Tammy is nice. A little ground down and withdrawn and oddly assertive at times, maybe. But nice. 

She’s funny, too. And when Tammy orders them a drink each as if it’s nothing, Catherine feels a little... wooed? As if her heart picks up a little bit, and she feels specifically special, but she tries to just put it down to someone being nice to her. It has been a while. 

And in an attempt to ignore the lightness in her chest, she asks Tammy if she ever gets lonely living here by herself. Catherine has always thought of herself as a lonely person; no significant other, no children, and her relationship with her mother is vague at best. But at least she has her friends – her _family_ – even if some of them are a plane ride away. Tammy is adamant that she is fine and happy with her aloneness, defensive of that independence, and Catherine wonders what even just a week of companionship would do for her. Would it soften her? Would it blur her sharp edges and show her it’s okay to want to be wanted? To want to be loved? Cared for? 

God, she hasn’t even had a sip of beer yet. And wasn’t she here to work? 

But then Tammy is getting up, and she’s about to leave, and Catherine really doesn’t want her to. And before she analyses the why of that, she asks for her advice. She’s not even really sure she wants her advice; she just wants her to... stay. 

But Tammy says, “I’m uncomfortable in any one-on-one situation unless I can win.” 

And so apparently she’s playing darts. 

  


* * *

  


She knows she should be focusing on the tiny sharp weapons that are flying through the air and could definitely take her eye out, but she’s distracted. And she is aware, somewhere in her mind, that she’s being distracted by Tammy. Not by what she’s saying – although she is trying her best to listen to her advice – but by _her;_ the way her body moves as she shoots a dart, the way her cardigan is sitting on her shoulders, the way her lips twist into a little smile whenever she gets close to the bullseye. 

And then they’re back sitting at the bar and she’s saying exactly what Catherine needs to hear - they barely know each other, really, and have only been drinking in this bar for an hour, but she’s saying things like _work is a big part of who you are_ and god, it feels utterly overwhelming to be understood so suddenly. Maybe it’s obtuse and deflective to ignore all of the other elements to it – the exhaustion, the letting people down, the stretching herself too thin – but it just feels so good to hear. 

Maybe it’s because Tammy is the same: she has work, and work, and work. And nothing else. 

When she starts to talk about her childhood, she notices Tammy tensing up, and then she notices Tammy pushing through the initial unease and that she starts to listen, _really_ listen, and care, and it feels important. Her nods feel important. The conversation feels important. 

And then she builds her walls back up just as quickly, and she’s talking about kids with knives, and Catherine figures a conversation change is needed. 

“You know what’s crazy?” 

“Hm?” Tammy murmurs, gesturing at Pedro for another round. Catherine’s pretty sure it’ll be their fourth, and she doesn’t even drink beer, normally. 

“I brought some molly with me on this trip,” she starts, and she’s not entirely sure why she’s bringing this up, but at least it’s not family trauma, “because I heard that it can create, like, bonding experiences, you know?” 

Tammy turns back to look at her, something like interest and assessing in her eyes. And amusement. “Sure, I listened to that podcast.” 

“Oh, you did?” She’s not sure why she’s so surprised, but Tammy didn’t immediately strike her as a podcast person. 

Pedro puts two bottles down in front of Tammy and she passes one to Catherine despite the fact that she’s still nursing her current one, and says, “Yeah, the one about micro dosing?” 

“Yes!” And she smiles, not sure why it means so much to her that Tammy knows exactly what she’s talking about, “But no one wanted to try it with me.” 

Tammy takes a long sip from her new beer, and then says, “I’ll do it with you.” 

And _that’s_ why she brought it up, she realises, as if her conscious brain is finally catching up with her sub-conscious one. She wants to do molly with Tammy, because it means that right now doesn't end. And based on the nervous edge hidden under the confidence in Tammy words, she wants to do molly with Catherine, too. 

Tammy suggests they go back to hers because it’s just around the corner and probably a better place to dabble in drugs, and Catherine just nods, pretty sure she’d go anywhere Tammy suggested. It’s not until she’s standing outside Tammy’s front door, waiting while she pats her pockets in search of her keys, that she understands what’s happening: she’s just _gone home_ with Tammy. And maybe it doesn’t mean _that,_ maybe it does. 

Maybe she wants it to. 

  


* * *

  


Catherine knows that it probably has something to do with the beer and the molly, but the longer they sit huddled on Tammy’s couch, the cozier Tammy becomes. It starts when she lets the clip out of her hair. The pieces that were pulled back fall forward and across her face and Catherine has to hold her breath; she’s about a second away from reaching out and tucking it all behind her ear. When they’re each on their second glass of the wine Tammy had opened when they'd arrived, a certain gloss covers her eyes and it gives them a shine, as if all it would take would be for Catherine to say one nice and true thing, and Tammy would have to fight tears. And when she pulls a blanket off the back of the couch and around her shoulders – that’s it. It feels like there is very little hardness left. 

Catherine tries to remember the awkward and stoic women from before they started drinking together, but it’s really hard to trace back to. There’s still lingers of her, of course, because Catherine’s sure those things wind all the way down to her core. It’s not like she’s opening herself up entirely or completely letting go of the distance, but there is a hint of ease that wasn’t there before. She’s softened, in her own Tammy way, and Catherine can’t stop reveling in the smiles that she’s getting to see, and the wild tales from her past that she’s getting to hear. Taking a little bit of molly clearly isn’t as unusual for Tammy as it is for Catherine. 

“Do you ever miss your husband?” and maybe it’s uncouth to ask that so upfront, but Tammy talks about him in her stories with a certain detachment that Catherine can’t figure out. If they were married, if they loved each other, surely there was some pain there? Some grief? 

“Sure, sometimes.” There’s an odd, faraway look in Tammy’s eyes when she says that, so Catherine doesn’t push it, is happy to let her questions fade into the air and the walls, but then Tammy adds, “I think I’m a different person now, but I miss him in the old parts of me.” 

“But not in the new?” and she wonders if this is the bonding part of the molly. 

“No, not in the new.” Tammy tips her half-full wine glass towards Catherine, “What about you? Are you married? Divorced?” 

“Oh,” and she tries to laugh it off like this means nothing. “No, no, I’ve never been married. I’ve been so focused on work for so long, and I guess I’ve just never met the right man...” 

Tammy hums after she trails off, and there's a weight to the hum that Catherine doesn’t understand yet. And she honestly doesn’t know if it’s the molly or the wine, but she’s desperate for the giddiness of the feeling she got when Tammy was opening up about herself just before, so she takes a deep breath and asks, “Did you mean it, earlier? When you said that people are all the same?” 

When Tammy looks at her, their eyes catch, and she’s all loosened up and blanket-wrapped, a relent in her eyes that looks like an olive branch. And when she says, “I did mean it, yeah. But I think I’ve changed my mind,” Catherine takes it. 

She takes the olive branch.

The only other time she’s ever kissed a woman was when the bottle landed on Naomi at a party in their Chicago days, and they’d giggled through it. But they had been drunk and it had meant nothing. It was nothing like _this._ This was immediate: from the second she closed the distance between them, everything became so wholly specific. From the way Tammy had gasped in surprise and then immediately melted into it, grabbing Catherine’s neck with a pressure that made it seem like this was definitely wanted, to how her own hands curled around Tammy’s cardigan the way they’d been itching to since the game of darts – it all had a purpose. And the purpose was narrow, and it was because Tammy had somehow gotten under her skin and begun dancing. And it felt like the only way to comprehend that tickle was to kiss her, and figure it out. 

And so she does. She kisses her, but then all too quickly she’s pulling away and standing up and pacing back and forth and panicking because what the fuck is she doing? 

“God, Tammy – I'm so sorry. I don’t even- shit. _Shit_.” 

She doesn’t know how to find any sort of composure, and Tammy isn’t saying anything, and her head feels like it’s literally swirling, so she does the only thing she can think to do: escape. She turns on her heel and walks away with intent, picking up her phone and putting it in her back pocket on the way. She’s going to need to call a taxi. 

“I didn’t want you to stop, you know.” 

Catherine turns around, a little jumpy because she hadn’t heard Tammy follow her into the entrance way, and takes her in. She’s leaning in the door frame, looking just as eased and warm as before. Walls down. Open. _Soft._ Like she wants to be all of those things for Catherine. 

Like she doesn’t want her to go. 

Catherine frowns a little and tries to take it all in. It’s been a while since she really _felt_ that feeling of someone wanting her around. And she knows that’s a little unfair on her friends – they want her around, they do, but everyone is busy. Everyone has their own life. 

But now here is this person in front of her – somehow managing to get herself to a point where she wants to share something with Catherine even though it's hard for her, to share _that,_ specifically, and isn’t this what she wants so desperately? Connection? A tangible, textured fucking _connection,_ not some forced pleasantry with a colleague or a lacking flirtation with a man who bores her. 

And so who gives a fuck about anything else? 

It takes over her quite suddenly, and the only thing she can pinpoint it to being is desire. And it’s swirling through each of her limbs, like some sort of ignition she doesn’t really have control over. She steps forward, her right hand finding its way to Tammy’s waist and pushing, moving them backwards into the hall, pushing until Tammy connects with the wall behind her. If it hurts, or if this isn’t what she wants, she makes no show of it. In fact, her eyes are full of gravel and dark, much darker than before when they were shining on the couch. 

This time when they kiss, it feels like less of an impulse decision and more of a crafted one. 

And she really didn’t start this with any intention other than just making sure their lips connected – like there was some kind of pull and she needed to feel it, feel _this,_ feel Tammy’s hands in her hair making knots. Feel teeth scraping lips and moans being swallowed. Like there was no other option in the world but for them to make out like teenagers in Tammy’s hallway. But eventually making out like teenagers isn’t enough, and she needs more, and Tammy is encouraging her; moving her hands where she knows Catherine wants them to wander. And suddenly she’s undoing a jeans button, and a zipper, and letting her hand slip underneath and-

_Fuck._

She feels that word in her whole entire body – fuck. And Tammy must, too, because her hips move at the touch and her breath hitches against Catherine’s lips. And for a second she doesn’t know what to do. The panic from before starts to lift again, rising up in her chest. It feels too overwhelming to do anything, like even just the act of getting this far was too much. But then her mind reminds her of how much she needs more, something further along than just making out, and it’s because she wants to take and give and know that it all matters. So she pushes the panic down and starts to move her fingers, just lightly but not a tease - she's figuring it out, figuring out what to do. 

“Oh god, should I call Val?” 

She doesn’t mean to actually verbalise the words - they were meant to stay stuck in her throat, but she really doesn’t know what she’s doing here and it’s not like Tammy is wordy; this has only just started and she doesn’t know how to read her yet. Maybe Val could give her some advice. 

“Who on earth is Val?” and Tammy’s voice is a little wrecked, and okay. That’s something to work with. 

“She’s one of the women I’m here with,” and god, why on earth is she talking about her friend while her hand is down Tammy’s pants, moving and starting to have an impact on her if the little breathy inhales are anything to go by. Maybe she _is_ starting to learn how to read her. “She’s a lesbian.” 

And then Tammy – laughs. It's hearty and real, like she’s feeling the laughter deep inside of her chest, and Catherine wasn’t trying to be funny, but she’ll take it. She’ll take the sounds that are falling out of her and causing her to smile like that – like she doesn’t have to hide it. It’s fucking wonderful. 

“Do you want to...” and Tammy gestures towards what Catherine assumes is her bedroom, clearly ignoring her panic and choosing to steer them, instead. 

And when Catherine replies, “Yeah,” it’s a little breathless. 

  


* * *

  


Catherine’s never done this before. 

Had a one-night stand, or whatever this is. And she’s too incoherent and blissed out right now to think logically, but she thinks maybe she should go. Tammy hasn’t told her to, but she also hasn’t said anything at all since they, well, finished. She’s just lying there with her eyes closed, looking so beautiful in the dim light that Catherine wants smile and just _stare_ at her as if she had a sophomoric crush. There’s still a blush in her cheeks, and Catherine has that feeling again; the one where she wants to reach out and touch. 

But she doesn’t reach out and touch. She rolls over and starts to collect up her things, trying to stay quiet, but Tammy must have felt the dip in the bed and opens one eye. 

“Where are you going? Why are you always trying to leave?” 

“Oh, I-” Catherine starts, suddenly explicitly aware that she no longer has the comfort of a sheet around her and is standing, very bare, in Tammy’s bedroom. And without the lust and the back-and-forth, it feels entirely exposing and – real. “I just wasn’t sure-” 

“Come here,” Tammy says, with an authority that is clear but also kind, and she pats the spot that Catherine had just climbed out of. And so Catherine does, jeans still clutched in her hand, and she settles even closer to Tammy than before. 

And then Tammy does something she doesn’t expect and it is entirely intimate: turns her head and places a kiss to Catherine’s shoulder that is tender, and caring, and says, “Goodnight, Cath.” And she sighs, the weight of her body sinking into the mattress beneath her, and her breathing starts to slow down and even out. 

Catherine feels a wealth of emotion at that entire gesture – the kiss and the tenderness and the nickname – and it feels like too much for right now, so she pulls her phone out of her jeans pocket and checks the time. It’s 12:01. She opens up her messages and taps out, _Happy birthday_ _Becs_ _,_ because that’s much easier to focus on. She presses the little arrow. 

It doesn’t send. _Of course_ it fucking doesn’t. 

  


* * *

  


She wakes up warm; the words _I’m uncomfortable in any one-on-one situation unless I can win_ playing over and over in her head, and it’s being pieced together with snippets from last night – both of them pushing and pulling, both wanting control and to relinquish it, too. The competition of it all, rooted in wanting the other to feel more and to feel everything. The generosity in the competitiveness. And she has to throw the blankets off of her before she startles Tammy awake with urgent hands. 

But there is no Tammy to startle awake. 

Her side of the bed is empty, and sort of cold, and god, she shouldn’t have stayed. Tammy was in a post-sex haze when she told her to stay, and she should have trusted her gut. She shouldn’t be here. And she hadn’t even told the girls where she was and that she wasn’t coming home – surely they would be concerned. But there’s nothing on her phone; no missed calls or texts, and she knows the service around here is shit but they could have found a way to contact her if they were desperate. 

It’s rejection on all fronts that she’s feeling when she stumbles into Tammy’s kitchen, the last place left to look for her, dressed haphazardly in last night's clothes. And the feeling is on it’s way to overwhelming but then she sees her: Tammy, dressed in a long flannel and nothing else, standing at the stove top and cooking. 

“What are you doing?” 

Tammy startles a little at Catherine’s voice and the confusion in it and turns to look at her, “Oh, hey. Morning. I’m just making some breakfast.” Catherine can immediately hear that some of the roughness is back in her voice, and she can see it in her posture, too. Like so much of the softness from last night was down to the liquor. But then her lips quirk, and she amends - “I’m just making _us_ some breakfast.” 

And there is it. It hasn’t completely gone. 

Maybe it’s okay that she stayed. Maybe it’s okay that she’s still here. 

It’s French toast, and Catherine can’t remember the last time someone cooked for her like this. She had had a brief fling with an accountant last year who always made her breakfast the morning after, but it was only ever muesli. This is thought and effort with blueberries on the side. 

“What?” Tammy asks, the incredulous look on Catherine’s face not going unnoticed. 

“I just... didn’t pick you for the French toast on a Sunday morning type,” but she makes sure there’s affection in her tone, because she means it in a lovely way. 

“I’m not,” Tammy agrees. “Usually.” 

Catherine just nods; she can feel a weight in that, too, just like her hum last night, and she wonders when all of the heavy things will start to make sense. 

“I can’t believe my friends didn’t even notice that I was gone,” and she doesn’t mean to whine, but just because Tammy wants her right now, it doesn’t take the sting out of the other rejection. “I could have been kidnapped or murdered for all they know.” 

“Do you need me to give you a ride somewhere?” Tammy asks, and Catherine doesn't miss the avoidance of the topic, the sticking to the practical side of things instead. 

“Oh, that would be great. Thanks.” 

And then they finish breakfast – no mention of last night or anything in the future. They just chat about the weather and what Abby has planned for the day, and when Tammy drops her off at the house, they just wave goodbye. 

It feels a little deflating, like it all somehow meant everything and nothing at the same time, and she carries that confliction with her all the way to the winery where she knows everyone will be for Rebecca’s brunch. And it’s that mixed in with the lingering pain of being forgotten that causes her to stride into the room bitter. 

  


* * *

  


Maybe the swan dive was worth it, after all. 

Because Tammy is here, and she’s driving them all back to the house, and Catherine has somehow managed to get the passenger seat. She’s glad she’s not the one actually doing the driving, though, because Tammy is doing that thing where she distracts her again. 

So she keeps her eyes on the road ahead and listens as everyone laughs and talks about the snake and the hill and the hospital. 

“Doctor Dickswing?” Tammy asks the whole group, “Oh, I bet Brent will love that nickname.” 

Catherine chances a glance at her and their eyes catch briefly, and Tammy’s are sparkling with mischief. She wants to ask her if everyone knows everyone around here, but for some reason it feels too familiar to ask in front of the girls, as if her saying that simple question will alert everyone to the fact that they slept together last night. She refocuses on the road. 

When they pull up outside of the house, everyone else piles out of the car, happy in their chatter and excited to be able to shower and clean up. Naomi is hobbling, leaning on Jenny and Abby, with Val holding the door open for the trio. Rebecca is following behind them, and they don’t notice that Catherine hasn’t followed them. 

For once, it feels like a blessing and not an oversight. 

She’s lingering, and Tammy is too, but it’s obvious that neither of them know what to say. And then they both speak at the same time - 

“I need to come in and prepare the cheese and wine night that’s part of the package.” 

“Do you want to come in?” 

They both laugh a little, and it breaks some of the tension, and then Catherine decides to act her fucking age and just speak. 

“I- well, I really enjoyed our time together, Tammy. And I’m too old to do all of this,” and she gestured around them as if that explains what _this_ is, “And I know I’m leaving in the morning, but if this felt real to you at all-” 

“It did. It does,” Tammy cuts her off, and she looks a little uncomfortable at the omission without the alcohol to ease it all, but it’s something. And then she starts to settle into _them_ again, just like last night and this morning, and she smiles, “It does feel real for me.” 

“Okay,” and she can’t help her own smile, too. And there’s that giddiness. “Maybe we could-” 

But Tammy cuts her off again, “Here.” She’s holding out her business card – it looks sort of old and used, as if it’s been hanging out in Tammy’s wallet for years, and it probably has because it’s for the edible soap company. Catherine takes it, slides it between her fingers, and she _finally_ understands the weight. 

She understands what it all means. 

And it means there’s something more, here, between them. Something that goes beyond this weekend and into the next time. 

“You should stay for the wine and cheese,” Catherine says as they make their way inside the house. 

Tammy shakes her head, “Oh, I wouldn’t want to impose,” but there’s a waver in her voice that makes Catherine sure it wouldn’t take too much convincing to get her to stay. 

And then she wanders off, heading downstairs to what must be a small cellar – she hadn’t shown them that staircase during the tour – and Catherine carefully puts the business card into own wallet. 

She’s glad there’s a landline number on it. 

She doesn’t trust the cellphone signal here, and she wants this call to go through. 

**Author's Note:**

> amy poehler if you need help with the sequel let me know i'm tech avail


End file.
